Iraq requests EBRD development bank membership and support

DEAD SEA RESORT, Jordan (Reuters) - Iraq has made a formal request to become a member of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and to receive its support, the EBRD has confirmed.

FILE PHOTO: The sun is reflected off the windows of headquarter of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) in central London, Britain, November 22, Britain 2016. REUTERS/Stefan Wermuth

Sources told Reuters that Iraq’s authorities made the request in a recent letter. Its request for membership will be discussed when the 66 governments that currently act as the bank’s shareholders meet in Jordan on Wednesday.

“We can confirm that we have received an application for membership, with a view to becoming a country of operations, from Iraq,” an EBRD spokesman said. “This is a question for shareholders to form a view and take a decision.”

If Iraq is successful in its bid, it would take the number of countries the EBRD now operates in to well over 30.

Set up in 1991 to help former Soviet states transition to free-market capitalism, the multilateral lender now works from Morocco in north Africa, across central and south eastern Europe all the way to Mongolia in eastern Asia.